Create a Worn Comic Book Cover

[Nick Franco Art]

I have an image I designed in Illustrator, but I will be using Photoshop to make it look like a worn out, comic book cover. I'm specifically looking at a series of 10 cent novels from the early 1900s. Any advice or input?

[Chuck Uebele]

Have a yellow tinge to your image, and either create your own foxing pattern with a brush, or search for a foxing texture online that you can overlay the image with a blend mode like multiply.

[Nick Franco Art]

Thanks, Chuck. I haven't worked with foxing textures before. I had been using the splatter brush set at a low opacity, but I'm always looking for new techniques.

[c.pfaffenbichler]

You could also add miss-registration (like th eyellow in the totle) and halftone screens … 

As for the torn and wrinkled edges you may want to look for stock images from which you could isolate those elements. 

Can you post your illustration (or part of it)? 

[Nick Franco Art]

Thank you for the input. I looked up misregistration and found a good tutorial video. I think it might work perfectly. Here is my illustration:

[c.pfaffenbichler]

I am afraid that illustration may not lend itself very well to simulating those old-time puclications as (it is my impression at least) the cover illustrations back then usually incorporated a lot of black linework. (Not sure but they might have been engravings.)

Whereas you work with color areay primarily. 

[Nick Franco Art]

I tend to define my objects in Illustrator with broad shapes, rather than black outlines. What would you recommend? Is there an engraving technique I can apply or should I go back and outline the figure & landscape?